Colorado National Monument

After spending a day or so at Maroon Bells, we headed west towards the border of Utah – to see the sights around Grand Junction. The landscape slowly turned from evergreens and aspens lining jagged ridges to plateaus and mesas – glowing red in the afternoon sun.

We started the night with a flight of whiskey and my first experience eating Elk. It was a tartare too – we were feeling brave. It was all quite good!

Feeling full and happy we drove towards the Colorado National Monument – gorgeous canyons and gneiss–schist rock formations. We arrived at sunset – a great decision. The book cliffs laid out in front of us. For the first time, I understood the ‘purple mountains majesty’ line from America, the beautiful. The mountains were truly a hue of violet.

We had the vista we drove to all to ourselves and we were able to absorb the majesty of it all in absolute silence.

The trees and their bark are winding and wavy – reflecting the same phenomena in the landscape of winding rock layers.

The sun was setting on the opposite side of the monument so we decided to try to chase it. We drove as fast ( and as carefully ) as we could around each tight bend.

But we eventually found an excellent spot – not quite with the horizon in view – but a with stellar display of the sunset.

It was such a great experience we went back the next morning to get some more before we had to depart for Alamosa.

This is probably my favorite view of the national monument.

I absorbed every dusty, shrubby bit into my heart. I can’t wait to write my next post to show you the sights from here to Alamosa! The San Juan National Forest and the drive to and through is a must-do experience. We also had some wild stuff happen to us on the way – a reminder that travel has it’s bumps. I’ll post it soon!